The Knitting Lesson, Jean-Francois Millet, 1869

The above picture and the following text are both courtesy of the Saint Louis Art Museum. SLAM or more colloquially called ‘the Slammer’ has as its motto, engraved upon the lintel above the main entrance, “Dedicated to Art and Free to All”. Its generous photographic access policy is a boon to this blogger and many other art devotes. This is based on the large number of cameras that I saw last Sunday afternoon.

This oil on canvas painting was shown at the 1869 Salon where it attracted praise for the tenderness of the moment portrayed as a peasant mother teaches her daughter to knit, an important occupation for women within rural communities. The girl is absorbed in her work on a sock, using four needles and a ball of white yarn. Millet’s painting was inspired by study of his wife, Catherine Lemaire, and one of his six daughters.

Realist artists affirmed the importance of contemporary reality and sought to move away from classical art subjects such as scenes from the Bible, mythology and ancient history. Realist painters, like Millet, were often motivated by democratic ideals. They chose to portray society’s marginalized classes, like the peasantry.

It has been more than two months since Anne had her bike accident. In this interval she has been doing physical therapy (PT), for both her knee and the finger that she broke. She has two therapists, they tend to specialize by body part. Michael is responsible for beating her up around the knee and Carol is in charge of rapping her on the knuckles. All of the soreness that their practices has evoked, has had a positive effect. They also quantify Anne’s increasing range of motion and returning strength.

Over the holidays, Anne was able to resume her knitting. This is a domestic art that she dearly loves and had missed practicing while she still had pins protruding from her hand. Her first project was a very modest one, gift card ‘cardigans’ or cozies. She had me acquire some Starbucks gift cards and we photographed the finished products, shown below. The end ones were for Michael and his wife. He was going to give only gift cards, so Anne’s gift played well with his plans. The center cozy, easily the best of the lot, was for Carol, the person most responsible for Anne’s return to knitting. She has resumed some of her pre-accident projects, but still feels soreness, if she over does it.

Gift Card Cozies